From the Portland Press Herald:
Maine developing PFAS safety levels for locally grown food
Penelope Overton
February 1, 2023
Maine is developing a broad range of food safety standards intended to protect the public food system from forever chemicals and determine when local farmers trying to recover from a PFAS crisis can safely return to the market.
Maine already has safety limits for milk and beef, but its hunt for tainted wells and fields at more than 1,000 agricultural sites across the state where sludge was spread as fertilizer has state toxicologists scrambling to set food safety limits for other local crops and livestock, too.
Once these safety levels have been set, the state must decide when and how to use them, but one thing is certain – consumers shouldn’t expect all the food they buy in their local supermarket or even their farmer’s market to be tested for PFAS any time soon.
“Maine just doesn’t have the staffing, funding or testing capacity to screen everything grown or raised in Maine for PFAS, much less what we import into Maine,” Deputy Agriculture Commissioner Nancy McBrady said on Wednesday after briefing a legislative committee about forever chemicals.
Read more at the Portland Press Herald